A Few Bolts Loose
by SLOVA
Summary: IDW -G1 - Earth - Ratchet wants to keep to his gruff, old self, but this incessant human female seems to have knack for falling into trouble - and not even with her own kind. Can the CMO keep her away from Bugly and his crew? She's one . . . disinterested girl. What's the worth?
1. Chapter 1

**A roleplay between myself and my very good friend, Kari. She's taken control of Ratchet and I of the lady, Piper. In the incoming chapters, more characters will appear and I will give her credit where it is due.**

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In the middle of the night, legality was thrown to the wind. Going to a bar could easily lead to something more dangerous, the severity ranging from a buzzed drive home to a whimsical, hair-brained idea of finding some handguns and stepping into the nearest gas station for a quick register full of bucks.

"Hey, hey! Who the hell was that?!"

"I don't know!"

One of the women in the gas station had slipped away at the back exit while the drunken men waved their firearms at the traumatized cashiers. She wasn't an employee, not with those shorts. She tucked a pack of Marlboro Soft smokes in her jean jacket pocket, quickly making her way down the street to avoid those thugs. This wasn't an uncommon thing in New York, but the police still needed to be notified. She didn't appear scared at all. In fact, she was still generally calm. But, she wasn't stupid, so she sought refuge in a nearby convenience store, open twenty-four hours because of the pharmacy inside. She stepped inside, noting that the cashier was not there. She searched around, finally spotting someone. A gentleman near the pill popper department. He looked like a customer with his casual demeanor and calm, but bright blue eyes.

She tapped him on the shoulder, running a hand through her thick hair. "Hey, got a phone on you?"

He was well-dressed. Nothing too gaudy, but a rolled-up sleeved white dress shirt that tucked into a pair of dark slacks, a belt securing him. He also wore an exhausted expression on his middle-aged face. He only replied with, "Use a payphone." very curtly.

"And me without a quarter," replied the young woman, not looking bothered by his attitude in the least. She was looking at him strangely. On her part, not his. Like there was a cloud of mist in between the two of them. It didn't register that he was being blandly rude to her with his response.

"I can see it . . . at your hip. I've gotta call the cops; will ya help me out, I wonder . . . . "

He quirked a brow at her when she continued to speak. Oh great, he thought to himself, another intoxicated person spewing nonsense at him. He wondered if alcohol had some blinding effect. Everyone who he encountered had glazed-over eyes, but this female seemed to be looking straight through him, though he was sure she was talking to him. The police remark caught his attention, though.

"Police?" he repeated, his expression more severe. "Why?"

The young lady admitted, "Some guys at the 7UP down the way. Armed robbery."

"_What_?! Why didn't you tell me that earlier?" the stranger barked back, suddenly marching towards the door. "The police won't make it in time," he muttered. He was either brave or drunk himself. Heading out to take on burglars by himself? Without any weapons? Worst of all he was headed straight for an ambulance parked next to the pharmacy outside.

The young woman didn't follow him out immediately. She rolled her shoulder calmly, reaching outside the door just as he was nearing his truck. She didn't look surprised. "You'll get shot," she called to him, but looking quite the opposite way. "Won't do them any good."

He looked back at her, amused, as if there was some hidden joke that she couldn't comprehend. "Have a little faith," he replied, hopping into the driver's seat. The tires squealed, tossing dirt up in the air before he took off. Since she had walked into the convenience store, he figured that the 7UP was somewhere nearby despite the fact that New Yorkers walked everywhere. Luckily, his guess was right and to keep from being noticed, he parked in an alleyway on the opposite side. If there were any passers-by, they would see a man materialize out of thin air. A magic trick? There were multitudes of street performers in this city.

But he just stood there . . . staring at the brick wall . . . like an idiot to the outside world.

Just a block away, the 7UP's drunken thieves were making a break for it. There was one gunshot before they left, but it was only a shot at a light, which was meant to be for the security camera instead. As soon as they were out the glass doors with the cash register's bearings, the cashiers jumped for the phone. The two burglars were middle-aged men, on the thick side, bearded, one bald, one with a mullet, and smelled viciously of hard booze. They wobbled to a nearby, beat-up old Toyota, staggering with each heavy step.

Though he might have looked brain-damaged staring at the brick wall, he was actually peering straight through it, assessing the situation. It looked like the drunkards got what they came for. When one of them lifted their gun up, he materialized into the convenience store, just as they took out the light. Relieved, he ran over to the traumatized employees and customers to check on them.

"You alright?" he asked, only getting shaky nods as an answer as the owner contacted 911. The police could handle it, but with drunk idiots on the loose with a car and guns, he needed to intervene before someone /actually/ got shot. Before the victims could say more about his strange entry, he rocketed out the door, disappearing just as an ambulance rounded the corner and high-tailed it after the drunks, alarms blaring. The drunks were driving fast, but clumsily and to prevent any harm coming to people on the streets the ambulance unleashed . . . what looked like a weapon of some sort. The sides of the vehicle began to unfold, mechanical arms with colossal magnets on the ends of them emerging from within. They began to glow with a bright yellow energy, electricity crackling around the edges before a beam shot out and attached itself right to the small car. The ambulance hit its brakes and with the force of that magnet, the car wouldn't go anywhere.

The criminals swore out slurred profanity, stumbling out their Toyota suddenly to avoid whatever the hell their minds were surely conjuring up. What the hell, robot arms? Uh, no, chief! Crap didn't fly like that!

One of them, his pockets full of money, sloppily faltered back and tripped over a closed manhole, landing on his rear-end. The other sidestepped to get a look at the ambulance from the side.

"I'm . . . too drunk for this," he said, sweating profusely now. He swallowed, hearing the bleary sound of a different set of sirens in the oncoming distance. He wiped his mouth with his forearm, noticing a young girl on the other side of the street, a fair way's behind. It was the same girl in the shop from earlier, he thought.

He grimaced, hoisting up his pants and making a break for it unsteadily toward the alley where the young man with the bright eyes had been staring strangely at, or rather through, the walls.

"Oh no you don't," the valiant stranger muttered, the magnets suddenly retracting before a new weapon emerged. This one looked like a futuristic ray gun of some sort. The rings near the front of it turned a bright shade of cerulean blue before a different, jagged beam shot out from the very tip and hit the floor underneath the criminal's feet. The pavement turned to sheer ice, relieving the man of all friction to keep him standing up. In moments, the man had jumped out of the ambulance to grab both of the drunk men to tie them to the nearest light pole.

Dumbfounded, they submitted to defeat, without even really realizing . . . what had even happened with the robbing, let alone this truck turning into a machine of moving parts.

"What . . . the hell was all that?" the pretty lady from earlier, her heavily heavily painted eyes weary, stood a dozen feet away, looking to the truck - not the criminals nor the medic, but the truck.

With their submission, it didn't take long for him to leave them there at the light pole and head back to the ambulance. He gave the girl a nervous glance before approaching her and sticking a finger to her mouth. "You didn't see anything. Am I clear?" The drunks could be written off as raving lunatics, but the police might actually believe this girl if she were to tell them what she saw. The sirens were getting closer and he lifted his gaze to the road beyond the convenience store. With one last look at her, he turned to flee.

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**Thanks for reading! Reviews are appreciated.**


	2. Whoops

So this story is getting scrapped in **THIS **tag, but it's available in the cartoons tag. The new one, the same one, can be found on my profile page, under the same name.

E

This will be deleted in a week, but the other will still continue to be updated.

Thanks.  
-SLOVA


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